Officials want U.S. Postal Service to recognize West Valley City

WEST VALLEY CITY — ZIP codes have been causing officials in West Valley City headaches for years.

City leaders say four ZIP codes — 84118, 84119, 84120 and 84128 — are technically listed as Salt Lake City, even though they're really part of West Valley City.

They’ve been trying to get the U.S. Postal Service to properly recognize their city for a long time without any luck.

"You'd think over a few years after incorporation that the post office and other entities would recognize, ‘Oh, here's an independent municipality,' and correct things accordingly,” said West Valley City Mayor Mike Winder. “Obviously, most groups have done that."

Winder said the city has formally requested to have these ZIP codes listed as inside its city limits, but the U.S. Postal Service denied the request.

"When we talked to the post office about it, they said, ‘You're technically a branch of the Salt Lake City Post Office,' and we're just out of luck," Winder said.

So, what's the big deal? Winder said a lot of online businesses can't find West Valley City because they get their info from the U.S. Postal Service.

"It's frustrating when you're the second-largest city in Utah and there are different online databases or e-commerce sites where you type in ‘West Valley City' and it says, ‘No such place,'" the mayor said.

He claims some businesses within the city have had to say they're in Salt Lake City when they really aren't.

"Even their business cards or corporate letterhead says ‘Salt Lake City' instead of ‘West Valley City' because the out-of-state people putting that together for them look at the ZIP code data," Winder said.

Since the Postal Service won't make the changes, Winder said the city has asked for help from Utah's big guns. He said lawmakers like Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, have offered to support the city's proposals to have the changes made.